Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, WOMAN; A FRAGMENT, by FRANCES SARGENT OSGOOD


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

WOMAN; A FRAGMENT, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Within a frame, more glorious than the gem
Last Line: Why let the docile darling have -- her way!
Alternate Author Name(s): Vane, Violet
Subject(s): Freedom; Love; Memory; Truth; Women; Liberty


Within a frame, more glorious than the gem
To which Titania could her sylph condemn,
Fair woman's spirit dreams the hours away,
Content at times in that bright home to stay,
So that you let her deck her beauty still,
And waltz and warble at her own sweet will.
Taught to restrain, in cold Decorum's school,
The step, the smile, to glance and dance by rule;
To smooth alike her words and waving tress,
And her pure heart's impetuous play repress;
Each airy impulse -- every frolic thought
Forbidden, if by Fashion's law untaught,
The graceful houri of your heavenlier hours
Forgets, in gay saloons, her native bowers,
Forgets her glorious home -- her angel-birth --
Content to share the passing joys of earth;
Save when, at intervals, a ray of love
Pleads to her spirit from the realms above,
Plays on her pinions shut, and softly sings
In low AEolian tones of heavenly things.
Ah! then dim memories dawn upon the soul
Of that celestial home from which she stole;
She feels its fragrant airs around her blow;
She sees the immortal bowers of beauty glow;
And faint and far, but how divinely sweet!
She hears the music where its angels meet.
Then wave her starry wings in hope and shame,
Their fire illumes the fair, transparent frame,
Fills the dark eyes with passionate thought the while,
Blooms in the blush and lightens in the smile:
No longer then the toy, the doll, the slave,
But frank, heroic, beautiful, and brave,
She rises, radiant in immortal youth,
And wildly pleads for Freedom and for Truth!

These captive Peris all around you smile,
And one I've met who might a god beguile.
She's stolen from Nature all her loveliest spells:
Upon her cheek morn's blushing splendour dwells,
The starry midnight kindles in her eyes,
The gold of sunset on her ringlets lies,
And to the ripple of a rill, 'tis said,
She tuned her voice and timed her airy tread!
No rule restrains her thrilling laugh, or moulds
Her flowing robe to tyrant Fashion's folds;
No custom chains the grace in that fair girl,
That sways her willowy form or waves her careless curl.
I plead not that she share each sterner task;
The cold reformers know not what they ask;
I only seek for our transplanted fay,
That she may have -- in all fair ways -- her way!
I would not see the aerial creature trip,
A blooming sailor, up some giant ship,
Some man-of-war -- to reef the topsail high --
Ah! reef your curls -- and let the canvas fly!
Nor would I bid her quit her 'broidery frame,
A fairy blacksmith by the forge's flame:
No! be the fires she kindles only those
With which man's iron nature wildly glows.
"Strike while the iron's hot," with all your art,
But strike Love's anvil in his yielding heart!
Nor should our sylph her tone's low music strain,
A listening senate with her wit to chain,
To rival Choate in rich and graceful lore,
Or challenge awful Webster to the floor,
Like that rash wight who raised the casket's lid,
And set a genius free the stars that hid.
Not thus forego the poetry of life,
The sacred names of mother, sister, wife!
Rob not the household hearth of all its glory,
Lose not those tones of musical delight,
All man has left, to tell him the sweet story
Of his remember'd home -- beyond the night.
Yet men too proudly use their tyrant power;
They chill the soft bloom of the fairy flower;
They bind the wing, that would but soar above
In search of purer air and holier love;
They hush the heart, that fondly pleads its wrong
In plaintive prayer or in impassion'd song.
Smile on, sweet flower! soar on, enchanted wing!
Since she ne'er asks but for one trifling thing,
Since but one want disturbs the graceful fay,
Why let the docile darling have -- her way!





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